Mercedes F1 team moved away from simulators, opting for driving on the track instead

DURING winter tests in Barcelona, Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg shared driving duties of the new Silver Arrow Mercedes, which they hope will secure back-to-back championships for the formula one racing team.

Over eight days, the F1 W07 hybrid clocked an unprecedented 6,000km of driving during the 1291 practice laps split between Hamilton and Rosberg.

This is a shift from the traditional practice of formula one racing teams spending most of their time in simulators as they prepare for championship races.

Head of Mercedes-Benz Motorsport Toto Wolff said while his team was still relying heavily on simulators, he felt they could gain greater insights into the new vehicle by driving it on the track — hence the extensive winter tests.

“Some of the drivers have really good results in simulation, but don’t necessarily perform well in the real car,” Wolff told news.com.au

“It’s a completely different ball game, emphasis on ‘ball’ or ‘balls’. It’s easy to drive a simulator flat out because the risk is low.”

In addition to testing the kahunas of drivers navigating through complicated courses at speeds up to 320km/h, Mr Wolff said driving on actual track offered a plethora of elements that are difficult to simulate.

“Winds, temperatures, climates in general, humidity and other cars on track all interfere so much in what the car actually does,” he said.

Head of Mercedes-Benz Motorsport Toto Wolff is confident his team can go back-to-back.Source: Getty Images

Mr Wolff said Mercedes is always mindful of ensuring it doesn’t take too much advantage of using real driving over the simulations.

“A day of testing is pretty expensive and I think you need to have respect for the whole grid. For some of the smaller teams that [level of testing] would be too much,” he said.

In saying that, Mr Wolff understands that simulators are still a core part of the F1 DNA.

“We are always going to seek the maximum performance benefit and the simulator gives performance benefit.”

Mr Wolff said as technology improves, the correlation between real-life driving and using the simulator becomes much closer.

“One of the main aims is to reduce the gaps between simulation and track,” he said.

“Our aim would be to run a car fully virtual on the simulator at various times, interconnecting them all and basically replicating as if the car would be driving in the real world.”

In the testing environment, the Mercedes team has been using 1000 sensors to capture data, which will be limited to 200 sensors during the racing season in order to save weight.

“You have to get the balance right because in order to finish first, first you have to finish,” he said.

“The whole car is on a lifeline and we are checking all those systems permanently.”